Sunday, 19 February 2012

Snivel and cough + TCR #98 Always Time For a Coffee and special love from Latvia and US

FIRST OF ALL I WANT TO WARN YOU - THIS IS GOING TO BE A VERY LONG POST! so if you're not interested in seeing pics or reading about my recent trip to London, or Liebster Awards, you might want to scroll down to my TCR #98 double-pager "Always Time For A Coffee".

Got home from London a week ago and was thrown into the hurly burly of my office work the second I stepped in through the door. I had actually been missed! *giggle* good to know the work I do is actually noticed :))

Seems I had a crowd of stowaways with me home too. No wonder as half of my group actually visibly developed different stages of flu while we were having dinner one of the evenings. Scary stuff! Well, I didn't exactly have time to be off sick again so thank you Sudafed (non-prescripted miracle pills) for coming to my rescue. Don't want to know what's in them but they certainly unblocked my congested nose, took away sinus ache, head ache, fever, and allt he aches and pains so typical of a flu. Only thing is, one HAS TO sleep once the effect of the pills has subsided. So that's what I've been doing this whole week, fallen asleep at 08.00 p.m. every single evening.

As promised, here are some more photos from my trip. I finally got to do what I've been wanting to do for so many years, but with hubby in tow, never got around to doing it; going to the fabulous museums of London!

Among other things, I had pre-booked tickets for the Cecial Beaton photo exhibition at the Victoria & Albert. Cecial Beaton used to photograph for glitzy magz like Vogue so his photos of the Royal Family and particularly Princess and then later Queen Elizabeth II, are utterly dreamy. What a stunning beauty she was when young!

Also discovered a fab exhibittion by and on Annie Lennox (yes, the one from Eurythmics) at the V&A. One of the large photos of her was so cool, check this out. They had inserted lace onto the photo, and embroidered the bracelets on her wrists, her hat had a beautiful bling button/brad. Totally liftable for a scrappy page! Sorry the photo is kind of wonky, I had to take it with my mobile phone when the guard wasn't in sight. Naughty me, I know ...

I find it very difficult to appreciate modern art, but this time I really tried to give the whole concept a fair shot. Have to admit these installations did not make me change my mind, so sorry Saatchi Gallery and Tate Modern, you won't be seeing me again!

I am always amazed at how Mother Nature does her thing no matter what. It was snowing in London but still these flowers had it ingrained in them to bloom in February. Does anybody know what they are, know for sure that they are not roses:

I also had a stroll through Hyde Park which is huuuuge. On its left side is Kensington Gardens with Kensington Palace where Princess Diana used to live. It is being renovated at the moment, but the beautiful Orangery it its garden was open. There was a photo crew taking shots for their new brochure and website. All of us sitting there were asked for permission to be photographed, so whaddya know, I might end up slurping soup in their new brochure! :))

I had the loveliest of surprises posted on my blog both while I was a way and only this morning as well; two 2 sweet kind scrappy friends have nominated me for the Liebster Award! Liva Kalnina in Latvia and Kristie Taylor in the US. I am absolutely amazed and so very grateful for the love that you peeps are awarding me!

Liebster is German and means 'dearest' or 'beloved' but it can also mean 'favourite'. The idea of the Liebster Award is to bring attention to blogs with less than 200 followers. So, in the spirit of good fun i am passing this award on to five other bloggers. Please stop by and visit them.

Here are "The Rules"

1. show your thanks to the blogger who gave you the award by linking back to them.
2. reveal your five picks for the award and let them know.
3. post the award on your blog.
4. bask in the love from the most supportive people on the blogshare-other bloggers.
5. finally and the best rule of all,have fun and spread the love!

First, go check out Liva's blog. She lives in a country where scrapbooking is practically unknown and supplies have to be found and invented from everyday objects unless imported at exorbitant cost from abroad. Liva's creativity is fantastic and the warmth and sense of humour that she exudes is utterly beguiling:

Kristie is an amazing lady with the energy of two. Not only does she work as a nurse and has 4 boisterous children, she also finds the time to create bold and vibrant projects in addition to being on several DTs. Her experiments with colour, mediums and texture can make anyone green with envy. Wish I could have 1/4 of your energy sweetie!

After having agonized for what seemed like an eternity, HOW on earth could I choose only 5 people among ALL of the fantastic and amazing friends out there, the list could easily have amounted to 50 names, I finally picked the following 5 fabulous ladies:

1) LINDY GILLESPIE my numero uno Aussie team mate over at The Color Room. Through thick and thin, through sickness and heath, Lindy has always been there as a pillar of strenght, comfort and joy for me. Words cannot describe what I feel about this gorgeous, beautifully talented and infinitely graceful lady, simply don't have enough words Lindy! I dream of meeting you IRL one of these days, Brisbane is on top of my list when the day comes for my Australian trip and then comes Brisbane and Brisbane again. Life would be very empty without you Mrs G!

2) Gobsmackingly talented and versatile MARIANNE in Norway. She is just plain out of this world! Not only is she a scrapping goddess, she is the most wonderful and sweet person you can imagine. Love you to bits Marianne!

3) Wonderful, cheerful always encouraging and so so sweet PEARL LIU in Singapore. Pearl gave me the final push that made me start my blog and I am eternally grateful to her for doing it! I always visit her blog if I need happy inspiration, she is an awesome cardmaker too! her sense of humour always sends me into hysterical giggles!

4) JASMINE SHEA in Australia has been visiting me even when I myself didn't think anybody knew I existed. From the first moment she has spread her kindness and shared her wonderful scrappy journey with us. This beautiful lady certainly deserves a bath tub full of love!

5) HELEN TILBURY in South Africa. I have never met a person like Helen who has that special knack of treating each individual that she meets in such a personal and kind way. Even if I know she is having a hard time herself with different aspects of life and health, nothing of it ever shows in the love she leaves. Having said that, I haven't even begun to describe what a huge impact she has had on my scrapping!

Just as I went to copy the link to her blog, I saw her own post about Liebster and gosh! she had me on too! Cross my heart, we have not made a joint decision to award each other, promise! nor have we decided on the same names! it's simply the old saying of "great minds" and the miracle of love. I firmly believe that what you give out definitely comes back and a little love has never ever cost anything!

Well, Helen Tilbury decided to enter 10 names instead of 5 so I've simply decided to copy her and continue with 5 more names!

6) DEBBI TEHRANI must be the kindest soul on this planet! and what an amazing scrapper she is! I would so love to sit silent as a mouse next to her when she does her magic on her 8 x 8 layouts, simply stunning attention to detail! I think this gorgeous lady was sent from heavens to make our lives a better place and all of us touched by her words, so so much better scrappers and human beings. Debbi, you know how I love and admire you!

7) TINA WALKER oooooh oooooh fabulous faboulous Tina, what would I do without you? Mr Moose and Miss Flikka, your stellar pages shooting stars into my eyes and your friendship bring so much joy into my life. Thank you sweetie for being you and for your unbelievable inspiration! Mwah!

8) BELINDA SPENCER my fellow Aussie DT mate at The Color Room. We couldn't live more separately lives, she in faraway Australia and me in the northern outpost of the map but Belinda's heart has no boundaries and knows of no distances. I am so incredibly happy to have this fantastic lady in my scrappy life, everything she puts her dainty little hands on turns out magical. I adore her gentleness and stunning inspiration. So incredibly happy to be working with you Belinda! xoxoxo

9) BENTE FAGERBERG my pal who lives in Sweden and who brings so much joy and fun into my life. It was abolutely fabulous meeting with her on a couple of occasions last year. Mrs F has a true artistic flair and spirit winning the hearts of each and one that she touches with her vibrant personality and fantastic talent. This lady has been featured I don't know how many times on Two Peas and even scraplifted by the famous Karola Witczak herself. Despite her worldwinning tours, Bente is a down-to-earth person and one simply has to adore her!

10) is for all of you fantastic, unique, shining, loving people out there!! I have put you as number 10, but the truth is you are all number 1 for me. Thank you for lightening up my day, for making me love scrapbooking and for just being who you are, all of you!

NOW I've finally come to the double-pager I made for TCR #98.

Swedish Maja Design is our sponsor for the third week and boy has Marie, the owner, given us in the DT, absolutely paradisiac papers to work with. How about the colours; Lovely Lilac, Sage Green, Very Violet and Darkest Navy.

The Maja papers can be bought from numerous Scandinavian online stores. For a list of resellers in other parts of the world, please go to their website that you will find IF YOU CLICK HERE

Just look at the stunning mini album that Lydell Quin made for her nana's 90th birthday!! it serves as the inspirational photo and rightfully so!

I made a double-pager for the #98 palette and could easily have created 5 more given time off from my day-time work. This collection is called "Ska vi ta en fika?" means "Shall we have a coffee?" and consists of 16 double-sided heavenly thick papers. They have motives of berries, cake recipes, coffe cups, tea pots, stripes and Prince of Wales checks as well as soft flourishes and elegant swirls.

First a photo of both pages side by side and then I will show left and right as well. I am really sorry but the photo of both pages has a funny size when posted here, pls click on it so that you can see it properly on Flickr instead! thanks!

As this is a very long post, I am leaving out all the descriptions and lists of products used. Please just ask if there is anything you want to know about the pages.

LEFT PAGE.

AND THEN THE RIGHT PAGE.

THE END

... I promise you!

Brave, brave gals who actually made it through the whole post! Thanks a million times for bearing with me and for your visit!

Have a wonderful wonderful week! I'll be sitting in the jury for the Swedish Office Professionals Award on Monday evening and have to make a speech brrrr!

18 comments:

Oh THANKYOU SO MUCH Eila. Not only for the lovely award but also for the most gorgeous paragraph about me. You are an absolute treasure and a genuinely lovely person. You truly brighten up TCR with the sweet comments you leave everyone and always going to so much effort. It is a joy to be on the team with you. I do hope you are feeling better too. Flu is nasty. Oh and I hope I get an invite when you make it to Brissy!! xo

Eeeekkk!! I was so blown away I forgot to comment on your stunning layout!! First of all WTG on a double pager!! I love your use of those stunning papers and especially the way you have layered those doilies!! Beautiful work. I shall leave some more love over at TCR. :-)

yep its along post....beautiful pictures of your London Trip seens like you had lots of fun over there.Girls congrats with your stunnig awards.And lost beautiful 2 pages you have made with so many beautiful detials..have a great week byeeeee,lean

Oh Dear Eila....Thank you, Thank you, Thank you! This is so amazing! And your layouts inspire me week after week, after week. I also SO Love to read your stories behind the projects...You have such a flair for story telling and you put your heart into every layout. Thank you again for the Leibster! Hugs all the way from Snowy Salt Lake City. :)

Lovely two pager girly!I just wanted to share that I adore you, you made me feel right at home on TCR right away. You sent me private messages and shared parts of you life with me, and I thank you for that! I think that you are the kindest sweetest person and I adore your scrappy style. big huge ctber hugs, Kristie

Loved hearing about your trip and taking a peek! What rot that modern art is - some is good but that?! No wonder you won't be returning!! Thanks for the award :) I will have to screen-snip all those kind words you had to say about me LOL :) xx - and beautiful double pager for TCR - lovely colours this week - I have been awol from there for a while - I just can't ever get a page done by Tuesday. Have a good week & hope the speech goes well...

Hi Eila!Love your beautiful pictures and I really enjoyed reading your post! I've been to London but it was about 10 years ago..hope I could visit again!!And what a gorgeous double page layout!!Love the flowers and pics!Have a beautiful week!!Yuka xx

Hi Eila, hope you are now back to your normal adorable self, I think the flowers you ask about are Camellias's but not 100% sure! Gorgeous layout for TCR love the colours and the layering as usual divine, take care and have a great week, spring is on the way, Doreen x

About Me

Hello and welcome to my little corner of the world! My name is Eila Sandberg and I live in Sweden's capital called Stockholm on the east coast by the Baltic Sea. My family is a small one; it's me and my very supportive and patient husband and our 3 cats - Max, Alice and Elsa. I have a grown-up stepdaughter. My friends kindly let me scrap their children if I need willing guinea pigs for a layout. My roots are Finnish but I was born and raised in Sweden. I am an Anglofile and love everything beautiful, London is my favourite city in the whole world. I've been sort of dabbling with scrapping since 2009 but more seriously so since 2010. Scrapping is a wonderful way for me to gain balance and happiness in my otherwise very stressful office life, I scrap mainly 12 x 12 layouts. Thank you for visiting my blog! Your comments make me very happy!
You can email me on: eila.sandberg@telia.com